The time I’m referring to is not the time to lose 50 pounds, write that book you’ve been postponing, take a trip to Asia or get that degree you’ve always wanted … No!

These things are great, but often we get to accomplish them at the expense of something else, and are seldom repeated or equaled because of our lack of lifestyle and vision.

You set and do them as goals instead of as a way of life.

I’m referring to the time to do something that changes your options by giant leaps and bounds, and forever!

The time to go from scarcity to abundance and prosperity …the time to design a life where you decide what to do and when to do it without having to pay a negative price for doing so! -Just because you can!

I don’t understand Claudio …What “time” are you referring to?

I’m talking about the time you need to put in to make exponential changes in your life forever!

To make changes that are so qualitative that they rock every fiber of your being, changes thattransformand transcend.

But before you start thinking about this, here’s what your mind, friends and family may believe and tell you:

-I don’t know how!

-Things are the way they are supposed to be!

-I don’t have time to put in the “time”

-I’m safe, why rock the boat?

-Money and prosperity isn’t everything in life!

-Abundance is relative!

-I’m happy right now!

-I’m comfortable

I know, I know …in the years I’ve been in business, coaching and consulting business owners, I’ve heard it all, these are just a few.

I’ve said and felt ALL these things myself in multiple occasions! I’m a living example for each and every single one of them 🙂

But here’s how I deal with these common excuses on my way to a better life:

I don’t know how!——Find a way!

Things are the way they are supposed to be!——-No they are not, keep striving for better!

I don’t have time to put in the “time”——–A classic “excuse” and the main reason why you don’t have time for anything, including the things you really want to do!

Money and prosperity isn’t everything in life!——–You are right …but it sure does help, especially if you care and want to help others!

Abundance and prosperity are relative!——–No they are not, they are absolutes …You either have options and freedom or you don’t!

I’m happy right now!———The key here is to know when you are delusional, pseudo-content, you don’t care or are in denial. Truly happy people, I’ve noticed, are always in motion, searching, evolving, that’s what makes them happy!

I’m comfortable——-So are people that are buried or in a coma

A regretful and unhappy life? That won’t happen to me——–Just in case, don’t say that out loud or in public! …instead, start reflecting now!

These were some of my demons, I later came to find out I wasn’t alone …and you know what, neither are you!

I mean …even radio stations have a 5 O’clock horn letting you know you are now “FREE”. You have 2 days to roam the country side, let some steam off and run wild until Monday when you HAVE to come back to your self made prison for the next five days, for what they decide to pay you btw, and this you will do 72% of your God-given time for the rest of your life.

Are you kidding me!!?

This may not be you, but if you desperately look forward to Fridays 5 pm, see Wednesday as “hump day” and Monday is a day from Hell …then my contention is you are not very happy with your chosen business or profession, you may not admit this in public, but you are not a very happy guy or gal.

If you see the weekend as a temporary escape route, a time to unwind, unplug and have a chance to be “YOU” at least for 28% of your time, then I think you may need to re-evaluate your life and ask yourself a simple question: Why Am I Doing This?

The main reason you are not happy is not because you have to do it all over again on Monday, but because you are not in control of your life, someone or something else is …and WE … YOU were not meant to live that way!

If you are aware of this… Good for you! The question then is: “What are you going to do about it …How can you be “YOU” 7 days a week?”

So get busy working on a Plan where you control your time, because if you control your time …you control your life.

If you got upset at reading this, well you probably didn’t read this far … But GOOD if you did get upset! You are supposed to, because there is no hope or cure for those that feel nothing.

My advice is, take some time to think about your time in a different way, try owning it for a change, understand how precious it is, because it’s limited. So how do you want to spend it?

How do you want to spend it doing the things you want, deserve and were meant to be doing!

If you knew absolutely nothing about the Outdoors and you decided to go camping in the wilderness for three straight weeks, what would you need to take with you?

Most people start a venture like that thinking about the tools, I need to have all the tools and the latest camping shiny objects because let’s face it, tools are important when outdoors, without tools you can die! But let’s talk about the sequence, the mindset and process you should have to prepare for such event… right?

Not too long ago I took a 15 day course (Paid!) on how to set up a web based business from A-Z. I did it in 5 days. Now I know how to do that already, that’s my business, but if that’s the case why did I take that course? I knew 90% of that stuff already! To some people that would be a total waste of time and money right?

Not to me… and here’s why:

1. You Must Always Be Working On Your Craft… Going back to basics and working on them is what professionals do. Watch Tiger Woods hit the range and swing at 1000 balls after every round. Watch Michael Phelps repeat endless sets of boring and trivial drills specific to each stroke day after day. Watch Rafa Nadal work out. How many times does he practice the same swing, and tell me if you are willing to do that in your profession to stay on top of your game.

The truth is, most people don’t and then they wonder why they can’t elevate their game, work with people they want to work with, at the hours the prefer to and make the money they want!

In this particular case I was about to embark on a totally new different Industry and I needed to know how what I knew applied to to it… so a refresher it’s always a great way to get in the right mindset. But also a refresher course taught by someone with better results than me.

Always work on the basics of your craft as taught by mentors and leaders in your profession in order to elevate your game!

2. ( Most Important!) Doing #1 Keeps Me Centered On The WHY, Not The HOW…Here’s a big secret on why most people completely screw up worthwhile goals and ventures even before they start!

Ready? …Most people believe they have to know the HOW before they make a decision and take action, when in reality what they need is a real strong purpose behind it, the WHY. So because they don’t have a clear Why they take forever, if at all, to take ACTION while hiding and wasting precious time on figuring out the HOW.

99% of reasons why people don’t get off their butt to do what they’ve always wanted and as a result live the live they’ve always dreamed of is because they think they have to know HOW to do it before making a die-hard DECISION to actually do it! – If you make a decision it’s done! You’ve decided and not anything or anyone it’s going to dissuade you. Now you breakdown the HOW- and get to work, but it’s going to get DONE! The decision has been made.

This is the biggest mental trap to prosperity and success our species suffers from, it’s endemic and hereditary, and it’s the #1 cause of broken dreams World Wide!

See whatever HOW you choose, it’s going to be a tough ride no matter what …the HOW won’t help you to stay the course. Only the WHY can help you do that.

So before starting your home-based business in search of financial independence, deciding to do a channel swim, lose 50 pounds, or go into early retirement, figure out the WHY and have a clear vision why you are doing it …so that when things get tough, and they will, you are not the first one to QUIT while blaming everything and everyone but yourself.

Quitters forget their WHY and blame the HOW …Winners never forget WHY they are doing what their doing, and they figure out the HOW as they charge ahead.

If you have a strong PURPOSE and a powerful WHY you can stay in the fight as long as a takes, nothing and I mean nothing that gets thrown at you will be powerful enough to derail you and change your destiny, which is to be anything you want and deserve to BE!

A friend of mine made this comment to me last week. Great question isn’t it?

A couple of answers came to mind right away.

One is that, you are not stepping up to your purpose. Meaning you are not doing meaningful work, and if you’d like to dig deeper then define what “meaningful” means to you.

The second would be that since we can remember, we’ve been fed the story that the steady 40 hour a week job in a suit and tie, driving the fifty thousand dollar car, with the average size home and weekends off, with 2 weeks vacation a year, and happy hour drinks with a bunch of friends in the same boat is actually something you can call a LIFE! -of course all of that is a bunch of BS!

If you think that’s success my friend we are in a serious disagreement and you are DELUSIONAL…!

The thing is most people wont admit how miserable and unhappy they are. They compare their lives with someone’s who’s doing far worse than they are, never with someone whom they could aspire to be like.

So that way of thinking keeps them sheltered from the truth… which is that THEY – YOU are living a life without purpose!

There are people out there that make a lot of money, but they have no time. There other’s that have a lot of time, but don’t make enough money. And there is the worse kind… which is where most of us were or still are, which is “we have no time and make no money”. I call that place Middle Class Purgatory!

I always suggest to go back to what’s meaningful to you. Take stock of what lit the fire in you once and try to rekindle that feeling.

There are many ways to make a meaningful living these days… you don’t have to be a millionaire, you just have to know what you want!

There hasn’t been a better time in history than now, where the cost of producing and selling information, advise and specific skills is easier and more scalable than ever!

A book I recommend as a top read on the topic and to get your juices flowing is:

The $100 Startup: Reinvent the Way You Make a Living, Do What You Love, and Create a New Future – Chris Guilleabeau takes us through real life examples of regular people who are not only making money doing what they love, but have attained financial independence and personal freedom in the process. Great read if you still have doubts about getting something going and finally getting off your butt and start doing what you were meant to do… which believe me, it’s probably not what you are doing right now for someone else!

Make a move soon before you REALLY run out of time… If you need to talk about it, you know how to reach me! 🙂

Think about that word for a second Dream Job… maybe is just me, but the word “job” should never be anywhere near the word “dream”

What does that even mean?

Go back for a second, when you were a bit younger and less indoctrinated… remember how you felt when thinking about the things you wanted to with your life, the dreams you had, the things that really made you smile and get up in the morning all pumped up… or better yet, not having gone to bed at all!

Does the word “Job” fit anywhere around that vision?

Yet you do a Google search for the word “dream job” and you get this:

About 730,000,000 results (0.65 seconds)

No one that’s happy living their dream and making amazing amounts of money at it sees it as a job!

So what do you say –should we start changing the way we think about doing the things everyone else is doing and getting nowhere?

So now that we’ve cleared that up I wanted to accomplish a few things here:

share some hard data regarding the job market out there for newly minted grads,

what the numbers really mean, and

what I would do with that info if I was graduating college in 2014.

Then bring it all together in order to deliver to you what the title of the post promises… deal?

Let’s start with defining what is a lifestyle business is:

A lifestyle business is how you choose to spend your most precious asset –time, while generating a desired income amount.

In other words you fit your work to your lifestyle, not your lifestyle to your work.

You can see the dilemma in choosing how you spend your time while working for someone else right!

It’s a very common narrative, you start with a vague notion of what you like, figure out how much it pays, find out how long you have to study and how much is going to cost you.

Sometimes is not even your idea to study a specific career, sometimes the idea was seeded by your parents, teachers, friends, a movie, who knows!

If you are in your early to mid twenties you don’t have to figure it all out right now… don’t let anyone put that kind of pressure on you!

Give yourself the time to explore and learn about the things you are good at vs. the things you are great at.

But while figuring all that out always focus on cracking the “how do I make a living code”

Your chosen career or business MUST lead to these 8 outcomes:

Live life on your terms

Above average or unlimited income

Financial freedom

Your own business

More spare time

Personal growth and development

Helping others

Freedom from debts

If your choice doesn’t lead to every single one of these 8 benefits, then is back to the drawing board.

Are you covered on all these 8 points as far as having a fulfilling life through your profession?

If the answer is no, then… Why?

Don’t press them too hard for an answer, you don’t want to upset anyone, just make them think.

You need to build a Lifestyle Business because is the “Normal State of Existence” …not the “Common State of Existence” you are seeing from most of the people you know!

Here’s a secret hack on how to REALLY know if you’re a stepping to your purpose in life…

Ask yourself this question:

If time and money weren’t a consideration, would you be doing the same thing you are doing today or plan on doing in the near future?

If the answer is a resounding YES… then you are there, now scale it and keep learning!

If the answer is NO… then you are simply trading your time for money and making someone else’s purpose or dream come true.

But listen, don’t worry if at the onset this thinking doesn’t sit well with you… I get it and it’s normal. It should feel a bit awkward.

That’s because even though your generation is much more progressive than mine from a personal freedom and lifestyle perspective, you haven’t been trained to think like an entrepreneur.

Check this out, here are the College degrees with the highest starting salaries:

In 2013, only 29.3% had landed jobs prior to graduation. NACE also follows up post-graduation with a survey that asks recent grads whether they have landed a job. In 2011, the last year it compiled figures, NACE reported that 59% of grads had found jobs 6-8 months after graduation, meaning more than 40% were unemployed. This year that figure may be higher. In April, the Associated Press reporteddata it had gathered from government sources showing that 53.6% of the class of 2012 were jobless or underemployed 10 months after graduation. -source

Now I’ve never been good at math, but if it’s any consolation, the only Majors that showed positive growth are in the areas of business and technology.

But even then, any business that’s growing at only 2.30% a year is simply stagnant!

How can you possibly have a fulfilling life by earning $55,100 a year at a job where you work 40-50 hours a week, and only growing at a 2.3% pace?

How do you get out of that hole 5 years into it?

Is that the future you envisioned?

I’m guessing you feel just as dumbfounded and in some way bamboozled by an educational system and a life philosophy that does not prepare to be financially independent, on the contrary.

In my opinion, college should teach you how to learn, and how to apply that process to anything you decide to do. It shouldn’t be about get to an imaginary finish line, called a degree where you get a piece of paper which you spent 100K on that says you took the necessary credits to be X… Now go find someone that puts a price tag on your value and gives you permission to go on vacation.

I know you know there’s something not right here…

By the way I went to College. I was pre-med and took just about every science and elective available. I graduated with a Bachelor Degree, minored in Biology, BA in Liberal Arts after deciding not to pursue a Medical Degree. Best decision yet!

So I can speak with relative authority about the actual use of a traditional education. But I did learn how to learn, by reading books that were actually not in the curriculum… go figure!

But don’t go on a blame path… bureaucracies do what they do and so must you. Blaze your own trail!

If I was entering college in 2014 I would do exactly what we are teaching our 3 boys?

Be an independent thinker and a lifelong learner…

Go to College or continue on to University for the experience if you choose to do so.

Regardless, here are Mom and Dad’s and Grandparent’s personal life story of hardship all the way to success and abundance.

Here are the books you MUST read soon! Give them access to my kindle library.

Travel and teach them real life success and failure scenarios.

A promise is an unpaid debt, don’t make them lightly.

Healthy body, sharper mind!

Start a business NOW!

When you’ve left everything in the journey and you must leave it all… faith will carry you the rest of the way!

Teach them to fail elegantly and parley their successes.

Relationships come first, everything else second. Dump excess weight.

Crack the money code first, then step up to your purpose.

Don’t ever trade your time for money. If you must think of it as a transitional phase.

Find a girl that thinks she’s pretty, even if she’s not, and marry her! (…Dad got lucky. She thought it and she is)

Teach your kids the same things

Better stop here… or I’ll end up writing a book.

Hope you found this interesting and applicable… gotta take Aaron to swimming practice, see you out there 🙂

Just in case you are wondering why you would want to read faster for profits:

Exposure to more Business ideas than you’ll know what to do with.

Cutting edge strategies on unique topics from smarter people that have already done it!

Authority and Social Leadership – you read it? You lead the conversation!

Personal growth in this order: data-information-knowledge-wisdom-enlightenment

World Class Knowledge for pennies on the dollar.

Reach out and meet the author real-time and extend the value and network.

Cheap research from already researched topics

You’ll become a better writer and speaker!

Here’s what you DON’T need to do:

Take a speed reading course (…even though they are awesome and useful!)

Stay up till the wee hours of the night slobbering over the pages or your Kindle

Get up at monastic hours for a reading schedule

Sacrifice productivity or daylight to read

Spend a fortune at your local bookstore

Ignore your family

Medicate yourself

Here’s the only catch to be able to read faster for profits:

You have to Re-Learn how to read a book!

Reader Misconceptions – This applies to over 90% of so-called avid readers.

A quick *Note – I’m referring here to mostly self help, informative and business books. Not fiction or other leisure type reading.

Misconception #1 – The author must be really good if he wrote a book.

You know what you get really good at when you read a lot?

Spotting BS a mile away… I haven’t bought a book that blows in over 4 years… How?

Nowadays you can read a good chunk of it including the table of contents on Amazon. Plus if the author has a blog you can also go there and get a feeling for what this guy is about to pump in your head.

You can also check out their Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn profiles for conversations regarding their book. Also endorsements from people you already know, like and trust.

Misconception #2 – You must be a super-fast reader to read that many books.

Nope, you just need to know what you are after and a plan on how to get it really fast. Organizing your reading material by topic and dates is key here.

Misconception #3 – You can only read with your eyes.

Negative. Heard of audio books? Let me ask you… How many hours a week do you spend in your car? That’s right, most people listen to the radio, or chat on the phone, or pick their nose while driving.

My point is that you could be listening to an audio book or a podcast while you drive, workout, run, you get the idea.

The information I learned by episode 20 had already made me money! I learned while driving. In others words, I got paid to drive!

…and I hate driving unless I’m hitting the open road with the family. I’m convinced that if I ever do a country wide road trip I’ll end up with the equivalent of a Doctorate degree based on reading volume alone.

Misconception #4 – Reading is for people that have time.

Right… and making money is for people that don’t?

I don’t think I should spend too much time on this one.

Misconception #5 – I multitask and that’s how I read.

Multitasking is as most people define it or understand it, a misnomer, an oxymoron of cataclysmic proportion. There isn’t such a thing as multitasking, which is nothing more than lower percentage or quality completion levels of activity.

The most insanely productive people I know are not multitaskers and they would never consider themselves one.

What most people mislabel multitasking as, is really triaging. A task World War II doctors were already doing in the battlefield by visually assigning a priority scale to the wounded depending on whether they had a bullet in the leg vs. the neck.

A strategy you can also apply to your reading portfolio by the way. I’ve been triaging my reading for years with awesome results.

Misconception #6 – I never finish the books I start!…that’s why I don’t even bother.

Yes I know, and you shouldn’t either.

Who says you have to finish a book that sucks. If you’ve learned all you are going to, or don’t feel like the author can teach you anything else, dump it.

If you get one or two good ideas from a book, that’s great! If you get more than that… Awesome!

Now put them to work!

Let me share with you briefly how I approach my reading,

The best authors write their chapters somewhat interrelated, but not interdependent.

The best books are the ones that I read as reference guides, where each chapter is a gem on its own.

That’s why I spend some time studying the table of contents, researching the author, reading Amazon reviews, etc.

Remember the focus and ultimate goal of reading any book is to walk away with 1-2 relevant and applicable ideas,

I never ever read the basics, or what I consider myself to be proficient in, unless I’m learning what their method to teach is, -but for self consumption I go straight to areas where I’m going to learn something insightful or at least skinned in a different way.

Everything else I scan. If something catches my eye, I grab it.

This allows me to cut the time that would normally take me to read that book by about 60%

So say I find the chapters or pages related to “email marketing”, I then hit everything there is on those books on that topic but from different authors. This gives me a wide perspective and different views on the subject. I’m already very familiar with the topic, now I’m looking for unique insights (gold nuggets) from these guys!

The average book I read form vetted authors I know has 3-8 good insights or ideas that I can apply.

A lot depends on the book also, for example I’m reading about 4 books on Copywriting this month, one of them a re-read because it’s a classic. The other 3 are from well known proven authors and master copywriters.

From these guys you can expect a lot more than just 3-8 ideas, so the challenge for me is the same as when I go to a buffet, don’t eat with my eyes.

I ask myself how I can take one or two, preferably only one of these ideas and implement it right away…always, always be implementing.

Always be testing, trying new things and learning what works for you and what doesn’t.

I also listen to 4-5 podcasts at any time, and about 2 audio books a month.

The downside of listening: it’s considerably slower than reading.

The upside: It’s attention independent.

You can be running, working out, driving, walking and be listening to any selective content you want, the catch is that you are constrained by the duration of that content.

Right now I consume about 10-12 books a month on average without it really making a dent on the rest of my personal or business schedule.

By the way, I also schedule reading sessions as part of my work, kind of mandatory.

I block time for it. Like when I’m doing marketing research for a client I’m working with, I block chunks of time.

I should mention that a major factor that allowed me to go from 4-5 books a month to double that at half my prior cost was… you guessed it… Kindle!

I buy 90% of my reading material digitally via Kindle/Amazon bookstore. When you think about the space-time efficiencies in carrying that much information and knowledge in your pocket, is mind blowing …isn’t?

Just the other day, not too long ago, we invented paper, then the printing press!

Here’s the other thing that wows me.

Think of all the effort, knowledge and time that goes into writing a book, of everything that person had to go through to make that production a reality… And then you and I pick it up for less than fifteen to twenty bucks… IF… because the average price for a kindle book these days is $9.99.

I better leave it off here. This is a topic I love to write, talk and obviously read about.

There might be an E-book in the process here. Something along the lines of “Reading for Profits”…something like that.

I don’t know, we’ll see… if I decide to write it that might drop me down to about 8 books a month.

What do you think… Fair trade?

[Bonus] – Read PX: The PX Project, a single 3-hour cognitive experiment, produced an average increase in reading speed of 386%.

Digital marketing is a central piece in any marketing strategy… and Claudio is one of the best digital marketers out there! His ability to help businesses take full advantage of social media, digital content, and in-bound marketing elements is unsurpassed. Please follow and like us:

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